


Read Between the Lines

by otherhawk



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: But he's trying, Diego Hargreeves is Bad at Feelings, Drug Addiction, Gen, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Klaus has powers, Pre series, Temporarily sober Klaus Hargreeves, The Hargreeves fail at communication, book burning, ghost books, ghosts are loud
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-12
Updated: 2020-03-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:28:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23121733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otherhawk/pseuds/otherhawk
Summary: Diego finds Klaus and Ben holed up in an apartment building burning books. Of course he only sees Klaus.“…are you sure you don’t want anything else? We could go clothes shopping, there are colours other than black, you know. I think you’d look great in teal…..no, I’m not trying to mess with your style, but you’ve been wearing that fucking hoodie for…fine, fine. I guess we can’t all be fashionplates.”Diego closed his eyes. Klaus’s voice was shrill and too cheerful, in that way he’d always been when he was pretending not to be afraid. He wondered what Klaus had taken. Wondered what nightmares he was trying to suppress.“Hola, mein bruder, are you just going to wait out there all night?”Set before the series
Relationships: Diego Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves
Comments: 34
Kudos: 454





	Read Between the Lines

**Author's Note:**

> This is a strange little idea with Klaus having a power I've never seen before. I've got another couple of ideas using the same power - I may write them at some point.

It was a quiet night for Diego and for once he wasn’t complaining about it too much. Two nights ago he’d finally broken up a human trafficking ring operating out of a restaurant near the docks, and it was good to see the city quiet for once. The worst crime he’d heard about over his police scanner so far was a junkie on a shoplifting spree hitting all the bookstores, and he was just about ready to call it a night and head home when he spotted the red glow coming from the condemned apartment building across the street.

Fuck. Last thing the city needed was a fire – it had been a long hot summer and everything was as dry as kindling. And while that building might be abandoned, the ones crowded around it definitely weren’t. He had to go and check it out – he still had nightmares about that serial arsonist from back in the Academy days.

The building was surprisingly secure; the doors were chained shut and the first floor windows all solidly boarded up. Evidently the owners were intent on discouraging squatters, and that made it all the more likely that there was someone up to no good. He had to climb up the fire-escape on the next building and leap across the alley to a window ledge in order to get in – normal squatters would have left themselves an easier escape route.

The glow had been coming from the fourth floor and as Diego stealthily moved up the stairs he could hear voices coming from upstairs. Or, rather, one voice. One voice holding an animated conversation with nothing. One familiar voice.

Klaus.

He hesitated for a long moment on the stairs, not sure whether he really wanted to go any further. He could probably trust his brother not to burn anything down – sure, he’d had that pyromaniac phase as a kid, but he’d always been surprisingly careful when he went around setting fires. And the last time they’d spoken was almost a year ago now, and it hadn’t gone well. Klaus was so fucking exhausting, and Diego had about reached his limit with trying to help someone who wouldn’t be helped.

Still, he missed Klaus. He missed all his family, and he lingered, letting himself listen.

“…are you sure you don’t want anything else? We could go clothes shopping, there are colours other than black, you know. I think you’d look great in teal…..no, I’m not trying to mess with your style, but you’ve been wearing that fucking hoodie for…fine, fine. I guess we can’t all be fashionplates.”

Diego closed his eyes. Klaus’s voice was shrill and too cheerful, in that way he’d always been when he was pretending not to be afraid. He wondered what Klaus had taken. Wondered what nightmares he was trying to suppress.

“Hola, mein bruder, are you just going to wait out there all night?”

Fuck. How…? He trudged up the stairs to see Klaus standing in front of a flaming barrel, his back to the stairs, a large pile of books by his side. As Diego watched he picked one up and dropped it into the flames.

Well. He guessed he’d solved the mystery of the book-stealing junkie.

“How’d you know I was there?”

Klaus twisted round to look at him…or not at him. Past him, around him, through him, his eyes darting all over the place. “Heard you coming. You’re very loud.”

Okay, that was just offensive. “Bullshit I am.”

“Well, your friends are,” Klaus said, waving a hand towards him.

Of course. His shoulders slumped. “I’m alone, Klaus,” he said, walking forwards into the room and standing in front of the barrel. There were a lot of books already inside, all burning away to nothing. How the fuck had Klaus even managed to carry all these? And why the fuck was he burning them?

Klaus glanced sideways at him and looked away immediately. “Of course you are,” he said brightly and he so obviously thought he was lying that it took Diego a moment to unclench his jaw.

“Right,” he said, closing his hand round his brother’s upper arm. “Here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to put this fire out, then we’re going to get something to eat before I take you to rehab.”

Klaus made a sound that was somewhere between a giggle and a scornful sigh. “Rehab won’t take me back yet, I’m _far_ too sober for them.”

He wasn't able to hold back the scoff...not that he tried to hard. It wasn't like Klaus would remember this. “You’re sober. Sure.”

“Temporarily, don’t worry, you don’t need to upend your whole world view, I’m still a useless junkie. But yes, I’m sober right now, why else would I be burning books? I’ve got a chip and everything.” He patted himself down, frowning more and more. “I had a chip?” He glanced across the barrel, towards Diego’s other side. “Where did I put my chip?”

“You probably left it with your dealer.”

“Hush, I wasn’t asking _you_ , you weren’t there. Oh. I left it in the bookshop, apparently.”

Out of the corner of his eye he could see Klaus pulling weird faces, holding a silent conversation with something only he could see. Sober. Right. He wasn’t even sober enough to pretend and Diego didn’t want to deal with this. “Uh huh. Like I said. Rehab. “ He started to haul Klaus towards the staircase, but to his surprise Klaus dug his heels in and fought back.

“No! I’m not finished yet! You need to let me finish, I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to… _Two_! Let go of me.”

There was desperation in Klaus’ voice. Anguish. He froze and automatically let go of his brother. Klaus didn’t normally bother trying to stop him when Diego wanted to take him to rehab or the hospital or wherever he needed to go.

He was only slightly surprised when Klaus didn’t push past him, didn’t try to escape, just darted back to the barrel and stared down inside. “Almost…yeah, can still manage a few more. What flavour?” Frantically he seized up another armful of books, tossing them aside one by one until he had three which he shoved into the barrel with a manic desperation, burning his hand in the process. “Ah! Fuck!”

Diego was there immediately. “Let me see.”

Klaus bared his teeth, his hand pressed into his chest. “It’s fine. Leave it. Why the fuck are you even here?”

“Why the fuck are you burning books?” he shot back. “Who the fuck does that?”

“ _I_ do!” Klaus proclaimed, dramatically throwing his arms wide and then quickly cradling his injured hand back to his chest. “Fuck.”

“Let me see,” Diego said again, and this time he didn’t take no for an answer, grabbing Klaus’ wrist and checking the damage. It wasn’t too bad. Not drag-Klaus-to-a-hospital bad. Just the sort of bad that made him miss Mom more than ever. “Right. I’ve got a first-aid kit in the car, come on.”

Klaus pulled his hand away. “I told you, not yet, I’m busy.”

He gritted his teeth. “Busy burning books?”

“Everyone needs a hobby.” The smile wasn’t at all friendly. “After all, Ben has to have better things to do than watch me shoot up and whore around.”

Fuck. He winced, recognising the words. His words, spat in anger, back when Klaus was still insisting that Ben was here, watching over them. “Shit. I didn’t mean it like…look, if you want to believe Ben’s looking out for us from somewhere, that’s fine. I just don’t know if I believe in the afterlife.”

There was a long moment of silence. For the first time Klaus was looking directly at him and Diego shifted uncomfortably. “You don’t believe in the afterlife.”

He shrugged.

Klaus spun around cackling, his arms flung wide again, as though appealing to an invisible studio audience. “You hear that, ladies, gentlemen, and those of us who know better? _He doesn’t believe in life after death_.” He broke off into helpless giggles.

Diego sighed. “Look, I believe you can see what you see…or you could if you were sober, I mean. I just…I don’t know, I don’t think that the ghosts are people’s souls, or whatever. You said yourself when we were kids that a lot of them don’t even look like people. They’re probably just memories, or something. Shadows, whatever. My point was, Ben’s gone.” And that was good - Klaus never liked to talk about his powers, but he'd said a few things when they were very young, and the idea of something wearing Ben's face, tormenting and tormented....no. No, it wasn't true. "He’s at peace now, let him go.”

The laughter stopped abruptly. Klaus was staring at him again. “I don’t know how,” he said, his voice so small Diego could hardly hear it.

He reached out – carefully – and patted Klaus’ shoulder – awkwardly. “Yeah. Grief’s a bitch. I miss him too.” He missed Klaus as well. Hell, he missed all his siblings, maybe even Luther.

They stood like that for a moment, and Diego thought that maybe he’d managed to do something right, until Klaus lurched forwards and grabbed another armful of books, dropping them into the fire before whirling round, clamping his hands over his ears.

“Shutupshutupshutup.”

He held his hands up, and gestured zipping his mouth shut but Klaus wasn’t looking at him.

“Stop saying that,” he demanded, pointing his finger at a patch of thin air just over Diego’s shoulder. “You’re a dick and I don’t like you and I’m glad you got stabbed.”

“Who got stabbed?” he asked, largely involuntarily.

Klaus turned to look at him with an obvious effort. “ _I_ don’t know, you're the one who stabbed him. Bulky guy, bleached blond hair, a knife through his eye…does that ring a bell?”

Wait. Wait, wait, wait. Wait a minute here. “Holy shit, are you actually sober?”

“Temporarily,” Klaus snapped, his arms crossed, fingers digging deep into his own flesh. “Just got out of rehab this morning, and it’s been a while since I was sober, so I thought I’d try and get some things done, but then _someone_ had to go and make it _loud_.”

Yeah. Ramos had been constantly shouting about something when he was alive. Made sense that whatever was left of him would be loud as well. “You’re sober,” he said, almost in wonder. He didn’t know when he’d last seen Klaus completely sober. For all he knew it was before they’d reached double digits. He should have remembered that Klaus was skittish and talked to thin air a long time before he ever started taking drugs. It had just been so long. “Fuck. You’re sober. Congratulations. And, uh, sorry for not believing you, I guess.”

Klaus blinked and looked aside. “Yeah. Well. It’s temporary, like I said.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” he said, hopeful and knowing it was stupid. “Maybe you could use this as a fresh start. Get clean for real. Find yourself a life and really stick it to the old man.”

“Is there an echo in here?” Klaus asked, and he held himself tighter. “Di….knife-eye-guy says he has a brother. Says his brother’s gonna kill you. Be careful, alright?”

He smiled slightly, touched that Klaus was trying to look out for him in his own weird way. “I will,” he promised. “Hey, why don’t you come home with me? I’ve got a mattress. And food.”

Klaus picked up the last few books that were lying scattered around and went through the same process as before, throwing some into the fire and discarding others. “You want me there to protect you from the brother? What are you going to do, throw me at him?”

In spite of himself his smile got a bit wider. “Hey, do you remember when I threw you down the stairs at that shit-talking kidnapper?”

There was a moment of silence, and then Klaus laughed again, light and gleeful this time, and he was grinning from ear to ear when he turned to look at Diego. “Yes! He was all like ‘Evil monologue, evil monologue’ and then – bam! Feral teenage junkie to the face!”

And now Diego was laughing too. “And Luther glaring at us afterwards, asking why I hadn’t just thrown a fire extinguisher or something, and then Ben – “

“ – and then Ben pipes up like “A fire extinguisher wouldn’t know to go for the eyes!” Klaus cackled. “Classic Ben!” He made a finger guns gesture, pointed nowhere in particular.

“Classic Ben,” Diego agreed, nostalgically. “For such a quiet guy he could really surprise you.”

Klaus abruptly doubled over, laughing more, and wheezing out something about ‘Bentacles’. Diego didn’t ask.

He nodded towards the barrel instead. “Your fire’s almost out. You ready to go?”

“What? Fuck.” Klaus straightened up and rushed back to the barrel, leaning over it so far that Diego braced himself to grab him if he should fall in. “Alright, this is the hard part. Cross your fingers….” He held his hands out over the smouldering ashes, and there was a sudden flash of blue light, and just for an instant Diego saw the barrel piled high with blue translucent books. Then he blinked, and it was gone, and Klaus was swaying and falling backwards like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Luckily he’d already been prepared, and he managed to grab Klaus before his head hit the ground. “Four! Four, are you alright?”

“Mmmm?” Klaus blinked blearily up at him. “Yeah. Yeah, ‘m fine. ‘s just a lot.”

“What was that?” he demanded, his heart racing. “Was that something with your powers?” He’d never seen Klaus do anything like that before.

“Shhh!” Klaus put a finger to his mouth. “Don’t tell Dad. We’re building a library. But it only works if I kill it myself. Like my homework. Not my fault if Pogo couldn’t read it.”

He remembered Klaus burning his homework. He remembered Klaus burning a lot of things. But he still didn’t understand. “But what – “

Klaus reached down and squeezed his hand. “Don’t tell Dad?” he asked again, voice small and cracked, and it was like being back in the Academy, whispering secrets to each other in the dark.

He squeezed back. “Course I won’t. Don’t worry. Now come on. I want to take a look at that burn, and then I promised you something to eat.” And then they could both head back to the gym and Klaus could take his mattress while he slept on the floor, and then tomorrow he’d try and talk Klaus into staying sober for one more day, and then the next day he’d try and talk him into two, and maybe, somehow, this time everything would work out for them.

“Loud,” Klaus complained as he helped him up, squinting like he had a headache.

“My place is nice and quiet,” Diego promised.

Klaus looked at him. “No,” he said hopelessly “It isn’t.”

  
  



End file.
